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Sunday, January 25, 2015

A Funny Thing Happened to Me On The Way to the Internet

When
I started writing these stories well over a year ago, it was purely to give
myself something to do. I don’t want to bore you with the details, other than
to say that my lifestyle allows for a considerable amount of free time. I was
already (still am) a published writer of outdoor lifestyle memoirs and humor
articles and books. But when I was not being outdoorsy, there wasn’t much to
write about. (It’s hard to write cool things about living on a boat and
cruising all around the eastern seaboard when I was in Colorado.) I was also a
published writer about sales, marketing, and business development stuff.

I
had never written any fiction before, and during one very long period of
inactivity, I decided to give it a shot. Unfortunately, I let my thinking get
sucked down into the abyss of complacency. I thought, How hard can it be? Well,
it was, indeed, hard. I thought my stories and scenes were entertaining, and my
characters had some life, but at first, they were a bit jumbled up. My early
output was, at best, sketchy. My grammar was putrid, punctuation was a bit of a
mess, and, my God, I hate past tense.

I
self-published on Amazon and Smashwords, promoted on Facebook and Twitter, and
low and behold, nothing happened to them sales-wise. Zippo. Oh, I sold a few,
and even got a favorable review or two, but overall, it was underwhelming.

Now,
I had no illusions about sales. I don’t need the money and it wasn’t a make or
break thing for me. But a little feedback would have been nice. And I did get
some. Here’s what the main feedback was: too simple, good voice (my dialogs,
apparently, were good), and fix my tenses. My self-made covers were pretty
bland, too.

Challenge
accepted.

Over
the last several months, I’ve poured myself into a project to do justice to the
stories and characters that I have grown to like so much. I have written,
rewritten, edited, re-edited, and otherwise tinkered with them to the edge of
obsession. And while they are still not perfect (They never are, are they?) I
think they are at the point that I can let them live on their own in the
virtual world, come what may.

I
am not an expert at writing, or anything else for that matter. Well, maybe I am
an expert at being me, with all my foibles, and even at that, I’m still kind of
sloppy at it. But I have learned some lessons through the experience.

People
don’t use good grammar. However, God does. Have you ever really listened to
how we mere mortals talk? Not write, but talk. We use terrible grammar, in all
its forms; catch phrases, bad adverbs and adjectives, ending sentences weirdly,
etc. So, when my characters are speaking in dialog, I try to give them a voice
that is natural sounding. But God (that is, the narrator or expositor) does use
good grammar. I mean, God would. Right?

I
appreciate rules, but…. Some years back I taught myself how to play the bass
guitar, and I got pretty good. I practiced my scales and technique until I got
to the point that I jammed fairly decently. I also read everything I could get
my hands on to hone my skills. Guess what? The entirety of the subject was as
conflicted and confusing as all the available writing tips are. However, there
was one bass guru, whose name I have unfortunately forgotten, gave the bit of advice I
needed to really give my playing the boost I was looking for. He said that all
of the practice and skill development exercises were good, but to really learn
how to play the bass guitar, you have to play.
He said to join just about any band you could, play to records of all different
genres, or just noodle around. If I wanted to get good at playing the bass
guitar, I had to play the bass
guitar. Not just work on technique, but jam, make mistakes, put it out there,
and grow.

For
every “rule” about writing that you find, there are a plethora of conflicting
rules. So, how did I reconcile all that? I follow good grammar and punctuation
rules, I watch my tenses, and I write. I write every day. I write whenever I
have time. And most importantly, I enjoy it. I think my writing has improved.

Pre-planning
can suck the joy out of anything Now,
before I go any further, I want to unequivocally say that I am not
anti-planning. Quite the contrary, actually. Remember I said that I’m a boater?
Trust me when I tell you that when it comes to that, I am the biggest
compulsive planner that exists on the planet. But when I really bared down and
decided to figure this whole fiction writing thing out, I was amazed at how
complicated the planning regimens were that other writers employed. To each
their own, but some of it seemed so lifeless and contrived to me. And my
opinion is not a rationalization for not planning myself. What I’m writing are
fantasies, adult fairy tales, whimsy, expressions of my imagination. Maybe I’m
being naive, but how do you plan fancy?

When
I start a new project, I sit at my computer, turn my imagination on, and I
write. One of the greatest joys that I experienced in all this was to see where
it took me. There have been countless times that when I wrote, the action took
some interesting twist that blew my mind. “Holy crap! What the heck just
happened? She did that? Did he really say that? How are they going to get out
of that mess?” I have had to do some brainwork ahead of time before I delved
into some parts of my writing. For instance, I had to do basic time lines of
all the characters in the Unconventional Affairs Trilogy because all the events
took place over a five year period, and I wanted to keep it all straight. But
other than that, I wrote and enjoyed the ride.

I
am my audience
When I sat down and wrote all of these stories, I pretty much knew that the
chance of them getting published or sold was pretty slim. I wasn’t following
the right formulas, they weren’t sophisticated enough, or whatever excuse I
could come up with for not trying to capitalize on them. I recognized that the
settings and storylines were not positioned well in the sweet spot of mass
appeal. There weren't any zombies or vampires, I guess. I didn’t have an audience. But, you know what? I did. Me.

I
love these characters and stories, and I still read them just because I enjoy
them. I can feel the victory and joy when Carol and Doug run into each other’s
arms in the lobby of Washington-Baltimore Mortgage Company. I love following Monica as she grows so wonderfully from a shy nerdy geek to an empowered beautiful young
woman. (And Gabe is one cool guy.) And, honestly, I cry when I read how Marie
begs Mark not to die after he was shot by Marshal Culver in Key West. I
appreciate how Amy’s opinion about Danny changes while she watches him cook
breakfast for them while she sitting on his kitchen counter wearing his St. Louis
Blues sweater. And, except for my wife, I think Connie Tangier is the hottest
woman on the planet. I created a little world inhabited by interesting people
that do interesting things. They’re fun to hang around with.

And
there’s a lot of me in there too. I’m the person that likes Doctor Who, and
wants a C7 Stingray. I’m a fan of the St. Louis Blues NHL hockey team. I also
have spent years as a business man and have worked countless conventions. I've spent a great deal of time in both Annapolis and Charleston and think they are wonderful places. I also believe that there is no other woman in the world like my wife, and she is everything I want and need. And,
perhaps most important, I believe that confidence is magic.

If
you have reached this point, thank you for taking the time to get here. And,
since you’re here, that makes you special, and I’ll be glad to send you a free
copy of the Unconventional Affairs trilogy. Email me at jaygaudette123@gmail.com.